1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to hinges for use with highly inorganically filled composite materials. More particularly, the invention relates to a hinge integrally made in a highly inorganically filled composite sheet, which can be formed into various containers or other products.
2. Related Applications
The present application is a divisional of copending U.S. application Ser. No. 08/192,965 entitled "Hinges for Highly Inorganically Filled Composite Materials," filed Feb. 7, 1994, which is a continuation-in-part of co-pending U.S. application Ser. No. 08/163,681 entitled "Hinges for Hydraulically Settable Materials," filed Dec. 6, 1993 (now abandoned), which is a continuation-in-part of the following co-pending applications: Ser. No. 08/101,500 entitled "Methods and Apparatus for Manufacturing Moldable Hydraulically Settable Sheets Used in Making Containers, Printed Materials, and Other Objects," filed Aug. 3, 1993 (pending); Ser. No. 08/095,662 entitled "Hydraulically Settable Containers and Other Articles for Storing, Dispensing, and Packaging Food and Beverages and Methods for Their Manufacture," filed Jul. 21, 1993, now issued as U.S. Pat. No. 5,385,764; Ser. No. 08/019,151 entitled "Cementitious Materials For Use In Packaging Containers and Their Methods of Manufacture," filed Feb. 17, 1993, now issued as U.S. Pat. No. 5,453,310; and Ser. No. 07/929,898 entitled "Cementitious Food and Beverage Storage, Dispensing, and Packaging Containers and The Methods of Manufacturing Same," filed Aug. 11, 1992 (now abandoned).
The aforementioned U.S. application Ser. No. 08/192,965 is also a continuation-in-part of co-pending U.S. application Ser. No. 08/152,354 entitled "Sheets Having a Highly Inorganically Filled Organic Polymer Matrix," filed Nov. 19, 1993 (now U.S. Pat. No. 5,508,072), which is a continuation-in-part of the following co-pending applications: Ser. No. 08/095,662 entitled "Hydraulically Settable Containers and Other Articles for Storing, Dispensing, and Packaging Food and Beverages and Methods for Their Manufacture," filed Jul. 21, 1993, now issued as U.S. Pat. No. 5,385,764; Ser. No. 07/982,383 entitled "Food and Beverage Containers Made from Inorganic Aggregates and Polysaccharide, Protein, or Synthetic Organic Binders, and the Methods of Manufacturing Such Containers," filed Nov. 25, 1992 (now abandoned); and Ser. No. 08/101,500 entitled "Methods And Apparatus For Manufacturing Moldable Hydraulically Settable Sheets Used In Making Containers, Printed Materials, And Other Objects," filed Aug. 3, 1993 (pending). Each of these co-pending applications is a continuation-in-part of U.S. application Ser. No. 07/929,898 entitled "Cementitious Food And Beverage Storage, Dispensing, And Packaging Containers And The Methods Of Manufacturing Same," filed Aug. 11, 1992 (now abandoned).
For purposes of disclosure of the present invention, each of the applications identified in this section are incorporated herein by specific reference.
3. The Relevant Technology
A. Sheets, Containers, and Other Packaging Materials
Thin, flexible sheets made from materials such as paper, paperboard, plastic, polystyrene, and even metals are presently used in enormous quantity as printed materials, labels, mats, and in the manufacture of other objects such as containers, separators, dividers, envelopes, lids, tops, cans, and other packaging materials. Advanced processing and packaging techniques presently allow an enormous variety of liquid and solid goods to be stored, packaged, or shipped while being protected from harmful elements.
Containers and other packaging materials protect goods from environmental influences and distribution damage, particularly from chemical and physical influences. Packaging helps protect an enormous variety of goods from gases, moisture, light, microorganisms, vermin, physical shock, crushing forces, vibration, leaking, or spilling. Some packaging materials also provide a medium for the dissemination of information to the consumer, such as the origin of manufacture, contents, advertising, instructions, brand identification, and pricing.
Typically, most containers and cups (including disposable containers) are made from paper, paperboard, plastic, polystyrene, glass and metal materials. Each year over 100 billion aluminum cans, billions of glass bottles and thousands of tons of paper and plastic are used in storing and dispensing soft drinks, juices, processed foods, grains, beer, etc. Outside of the food and beverage industry, packaging containers (and especially disposable containers) made from such materials are ubiquitous. Paper for printing, writing, photocopying, magazines, newspapers, books, wrappers, and other flat items made primarily from tree derived paper sheets are also manufactured each year in enormous quantities. In the United States alone, approximately 5 1/2 million tons of paper are consumed each year for packaging purposes, which represents only about 15% of the total annual domestic paper production.
B. Paper Materials
The general term "paper" is used for a wide range of matted or felted webs of vegetable fiber (mostly wood) that have been formed on a screen from a water suspension. The sheet materials that most people refer to as "paper" or "paperboard" are generally "tree paper" because these materials are manufactured from wood pulp derived from trees. Although tree paper may include inorganic fillers or extenders, starches, or other minor components, it will typically contain a relatively high wood fiber content, generally from about 80% to as high as 98% by volume of the paper sheet.
Tree paper is manufactured by processing wood pulp to the point of releasing the lignins and hemicellulose constituents of the raw wood pulp fibers, as well as fraying and fracturing the fibers themselves, in order to obtain a mixture of fibers, lignins, and hemicellulose that will be essentially self-binding through web physics. The broad category of cellulose-based paper, mainly plant, vegetable, or tree paper, will hereinafter collectively be referred to as "conventional paper."
The properties of an individual conventional paper or paperboard are extremely dependent on the properties of the pulps used. Pulp properties are dependent on both the source and the processing technique(s) used to prepare the pulp for paper-making. For example, coarse packaging papers are almost always made of unbleached kraft softwood pulps. Fine papers, generally made of bleached pulp, are typically used in applications demanding printing, writing, and special functional properties such as barriers to liquid and/or gaseous penetrants.
Conventional paper is typically manufactured by creating a highly aqueous slurry, or furnish, which is then substantially dewatered by first placing the slurry on a porous screen or wire sieve and then "squeegeeing" out the water using a roller nip. This first dewatering process results in a sheet having a water content of about 50-60%. After that, the partially dried paper sheet is further dried by heating the sheet, often by means of heated rollers. Because of the paper manufacturing process, as well as the limitations imposed by web physics, there has been an upper limit of the amount of inorganic aggregate fillers than can be impregnated within a conventional paper sheet.
In order to obtain the well-known properties that are typical of paper, substitute fibrous substrates have been added instead of wood derived fibers. These include a variety of plant fibers (known as "secondary fibers"), such as straw, flax, abaca, hemp, and bagasse. The resultant paper is often referred to as "plant paper". As in tree paper, plant paper relies on web physics, highly processed fibers, and highly aqueous fiber slurries in its manufacture.
C. The Impact of Paper, Plastic, Polystyrene, and Metals
A huge variety of objects such as containers, packing materials, mats, disposable utensils, reading or other printed materials, and decorative items are presently mass-produced from paper, cardboard, plastic, polystyrene, and metals. The vast majority of such items eventually wind up within our ever diminishing landfills, or worse, are scattered on the ground or dumped into bodies of water as litter.
Since plastic and polystyrene are essentially nonbiodegradable, they persist within the land and water as unsightly, value diminishing, and (in some cases) toxic foreign materials. Even paper or cardboard, believed by many to be biodegradable, can persist for years, even decades, within landfills where they are shielded from air, light, and water, which are all necessary for normal biodegradation activities. Metal products utilize valuable natural resources in their manufacture, and if not recycled, remain in the landfill and are unusable essentially forever.
Recently there has been a debate as to which of these materials (e.g., paper, cardboard, plastic, polystyrene, glass, or metal) is most damaging to the environment. Consciousness-raising organizations have convinced many people to substitute one material for another in order to be more environmentally "correct." The debate often misses the point that each of these materials has its own unique environmental weaknesses. One material may appear superior to another when viewed in light of a particular environmental problem, while ignoring different, often larger, problems associated with the supposedly preferred material. In fact, paper, cardboard, plastic, polystyrene, glass, and metal materials each has its own unique environmental weaknesses. The debate should, therefore, not be directed to which of these materials is more or less harmful to the environment, but should rather be directed toward asking: Can we find an alternative material that will solve most, if not all, of the various environmental problems associated with each of these presently used materials?
With the public's attention being focused on environmental issues, certain containment products have come under heavy scrutiny, especially disposable packing materials and boxes. Polystyrene products have more recently attracted the ire of environmental groups, particularly containers and other packaging materials. While polystyrene itself is a relatively inert substance, its manufacture involves the use of a variety of hazardous chemicals and starting materials. Unpolymerized styrene is very reactive and therefore presents a health problem to those who must handle it. Because styrene is manufactured from benzene (a known mutagen and probably a carcinogen), residual quantities of benzene can be found in styrene.
Most notably subject to criticism have been styrofoam products, which typically require the use of chlorofluorocarbons (or "CFC's") in their manufacture, as well as use of vast amounts of the ever shrinking petroleum reserves. In the manufacture of foams, including styrofoam (or blown polystyrene), CFC's (which are highly volatile liquids) are used to "puff" or "blow" the polystyrene which is then molded into foam cups and other food containers or packing materials. Unfortunately, CFC's have been linked to the destruction of the ozone layer, because they release chlorine products into the stratosphere. Even the substitution of less "environmentally damaging" blowing agents (e.g., HCFC, CO.sub.2, and pentanes) are still significantly harmful and their elimination would be beneficial.
As a result, there has been widespread clamor for companies to return to using more environmentally safe and low cost containers. Some environmentalists have even favored a return to more extensive use of paper products instead of polystyrene, if only because it is thought by some that paper represents the lesser of two evils. Nevertheless, although paper products are ostensibly biodegradable and have not been linked to the destruction of the ozone layer, recent studies have shown that the manufacture of paper probably more strongly impacts the environment than does the manufacture of polystyrene.
In fact, the wood pulp and paper industry has been identified as one of the five top polluters in the United States. For instance, products made from paper require ten times as much steam, fourteen to twenty times the electricity, and twice as much cooling water compared to an equivalent polystyrene product. Various studies have shown that the effluent from paper manufacturing contains ten to one hundred times the amount of contaminants produced in the manufacture of polystyrene foam.
Another drawback of the manufacture of paper and paperboard is the relatively large amount of energy that is required to produce paper. This includes the energy required to process wood pulp to the point that the fibers are sufficiently delignified and fray so that they are essentially self-binding under the principles of web physics. In addition, a large amount of energy is required in order to remove the water within conventional paper slurries, which contain water in amount of up to about 99.5% by volume. Because so much water must be removed from the slurry, it is necessary to literally suck water out of the slurry even before heated rollers can be used to dry the sheet. Moreover, much of the water that is sucked out of the sheets during the dewatering processes is usually discarded into the environment. This process, which has changed little in decades, is energy intensive, time consuming, and requires a significant initial investment.
Further, it is often necessary to coat many paper containers with a wax or plastic material in order to give the containers waterproofing properties. Moreover, if insulative properties are necessary, even more drastic modifications to the paper material in the container are necessary. Many types of plastic containers as well as coatings utilized with paper containers are derived from fossil fuels, mainly petroleum, and share many of the environmental concerns of petroleum refinement.
Paper or paperboard, believed by many to be biodegradable, can persist for years, even decades, within landfills where they are shielded from air, light, and water--all of which are required for normal biodegradation activities. There are reports of telephone books and newspapers having been lifted from garbage dumps that had been buried for decades. This longevity of paper is further complicated since it is common to treat, coat, or impregnate paper with various protective materials which further slow or prevent degradation.
Another problem with paper, paperboard, polystyrene, and plastic is that each of these requires relatively expensive organic starting materials, some of which are nonrenewable, such as the use of petroleum in the manufacture of polystyrene and plastic. Although trees used in making paper and paperboard are renewable in the strict sense of the word, their large land requirements and rapid depletion in certain areas of the world undermines this notion. Hence, the use of huge amounts of essentially nonrenewable starting materials in making sheets and objects therefrom cannot be sustained and is not wise from a long term perspective.
Furthermore, the processes used to make the packaging stock raw materials (such as paper pulp, styrene, or metal sheets) are very energy intensive, cause major amounts of water and air pollution, and require significant capital requirements. The manufacturing processes of plastic sheets or products vary, but they typically require precise control of both temperature and shear stress in order to make a usable product. In addition, the typical polystyrene or plastic manufacturing process is a high consumer of energy.
The manufacturing processes of forming metal sheets into containers (particularly cans made of aluminum and tin), blowing glass bottles, and shaping ceramic containers utilize high amounts of energy because of the necessity to melt and then separately work and shape the raw metal into an intermediate or final product. These high energy and processing requirements not only utilize valuable energy resources, but they also result in significant air, water, and heat pollution to the environment. While glass can be recycled, that portion that ends up in landfills is essentially non-degradable. Broken glass shards are very dangerous and can persist for years.
About the only effective way to reduce the shear volume of traditional container and packing wastes is through recycling. Recycling is not, however, without its contribution of large amounts of pollution into the environment in the form of fuel spent in transporting recyclables to recycling centers, as well as fuels and chemicals used in the recycling process itself. While significant efforts have been expended in recycling programs, only a portion of the raw material needs come from recycling--most of the raw material still comes from nonrenewable resources.
In spite of the more recent attention that has been given to reduce the use of the above materials, they continue to be used because of their superior properties of strength and, especially, mass productivity. Moreover, for any given use for which they were designed, such materials are relatively inexpensive, lightweight, easy to mold, strong, durable, and resistant to degradation during the use of the object in question.
D. Inorganic Materials
Essentially nondepletable inorganic materials such as clay, natural minerals, or stone have been used for millennia. Clay has found extensive use because of its ready moldability into a variety of objects including containers, tiles, and other useful objects. Some of the drawbacks of clay include the time it takes for clay to harden, the need to fire or sinter clay in order to achieve optimum strength properties, and the generally large, heavy, and bulky nature of clay. Unfired clay, in particular, has low tensile strength and is very brittle. Nevertheless, clay has found some use in the manufacture of other materials as a plentiful, inexhaustible, and low-cost filler, such as in paper or paperboard. However, because of the brittle and non-cohesive nature of clay when used as a filler, clay has generally not been included in amounts greater than about 20% by weight of the overall paper material.
Stone has been used in the manufacture of buildings, tools, containers, and other large, bulky objects. An obvious drawback of stone, however, is that it is very hard, brittle, and heavy, which limits its use to large, bulky objects of relatively high mass. Nevertheless, smaller or crushed stone can be used as an aggregate material in the manufacture of other products, such as hydraulically settable, or cementitious materials.
Hydraulically settable materials such as those that contain hydraulic cement or gypsum (hereinafter "hydraulically settable," "hydraulic," or "cementitious" compositions, materials, or mixtures) have been used to create useful, generally large, bulky structures that are durable, strong, and relatively inexpensive. For example, cement is a hydraulically settable binder derived from clay and limestone, and it is essentially nondepletable. Those materials containing a hydraulic cement are generally formed by mixing hydraulic cement with water and usually some type of aggregate to form a cementitious mixture, which hardens into concrete.
Ideally, a freshly mixed cementitious mixture is fairly nonviscous, semi-fluid, and capable of being mixed and formed by hand. Because of its fluid nature, concrete is generally shaped by being poured into a mold, worked to eliminate large air pockets, and allowed to harden. If the surface of the concrete structure is to be exposed, such as on a concrete sidewalk, additional efforts are made to finish the surface to make it more functional and to give it the desired surface characteristics.
Due to the high level of fluidity required for typical cementitious mixtures to have adequate workability, the uses of concrete and other hydraulically settable mixtures have been limited mainly to simple shapes which are generally large, heavy, and bulky, and which require mechanical forces to retain their shape for an extended period of time until sufficient hardening of the material has occurred. Another aspect of the limitations of traditional cementitious mixtures or slurries is that they have little or no form stability and they are molded into final form by pouring the mixture into a space having externally supported boundaries or walls.
It is precisely because of this lack of moldability (which may be the result of poor workability and/or poor form stability), coupled with the low tensile strength per unit weight, that hydraulically settable materials have traditionally been useful only for applications where size and weight are not limiting factors and where the forces or loads exerted on the concrete are generally limited to compressive forces or loads, as in, e.g., roads, foundations, sidewalks, and walls.
Moreover, previous hydraulically settable materials have been brittle, rigid, unable to be folded or bent, and have low elasticity, deflection and flexural strength. The brittle nature and lack of tensile strength (about 1-4 Mpa) in concrete is ubiquitously illustrated by the fact that concrete readily cracks or fractures upon the slightest amount of shrinkage or bending, unlike other materials such as metal, paper, plastic, or ceramic. Consequently, typical hydraulically settable materials have not been suitable for making small, lightweight objects, such as containers or thin sheets, which are better if made from materials with much higher tensile and flexural strengths per unit weight compared to typical hydraulically settable materials.
Another problem with traditional, and even more recently developed high strength concretes has been the lengthy curing times almost universally required for most concretes. Typical concrete products formed from a flowable mixture require a hardening period of 10-24 hours before the concrete is mechanically self-supporting, and upwards of a month before the concrete reaches a substantial amount of its maximum strength. Extreme care has had to be used to avoid moving the hydraulically settable articles until they have obtained sufficient strength to be demolded. Movement or demolding prior to this time has usually resulted in cracks and flaws in the hydraulically settable structural matrix. Once self-supporting, the object could be demolded, although it has not typically attained the majority of its ultimate strength until days or even weeks later.
Since the molds used in forming hydraulically settable objects are generally reused in the production of concrete products and a substantial period of time is required for even minimal curing of the concrete, it has been difficult to economically and commercially mass produce hydraulically settable objects. Although zero slump concrete has been used to produce large, bulky objects (such as molded slabs, large pipes, or bricks which are immediately self-supporting) on an economically commercial scale, such production is only useful in producing objects at a rate of a few thousand per day. Such compositions and methods cannot be used to mass produce small, thin-walled objects at a rate of thousands per hour.
Demolding a hydraulically settable object can create further problems. As concrete cures, it tends to bond to the forms unless expensive releasing agents are used. It is often necessary to wedge the forms loose to remove them. Such wedging, if not done properly and carefully each time, often results in cracking or breakage around the edges of the structure. This problem further limits the ability to make thin-walled hydraulically settable articles or shapes other than flat slabs, particularly in any type of a commercial mass production.
If the bond between the outer wall of the molded hydraulically settable article and the mold is greater than the internal cohesive or tensile strengths of the molded article, removal of the mold will likely break the relatively weak walls or other structural features of the molded article. Hence, traditional hydraulically settable objects must be large in volume, as well as extraordinarily simple in shape, in order to avoid breakage during demolding (unless expensive releasing agents and other precautions are used).
Typical processing techniques of concrete also require that it be properly consolidated after it is placed in order to ensure that no voids exist between the forms or in the structural matrix. This is usually accomplished through various methods of vibration or poking. The problem with consolidating, however, is that extensive overvibration of the concrete after it has been placed can result in segregation or bleeding of the concrete.
"Bleeding" is the migration of water to the top surface of freshly placed concrete caused by the settling of the heavier aggregate. Excessive bleeding increases the water to cement ratio near the top surface of the concrete slab, which correspondingly weakens and reduces the durability of the surface of the slab. The overworking of concrete during the finishing process not only brings an excess of water to the surface, but also fine material, thereby resulting in subsequent surface defects.
Although hydraulically settable materials have heretofore found commercial application only in the manufacture of large, bulky structural type objects, hydraulically settable mixtures have been created using a microstructural engineering approach which can be molded or shaped into relatively small, thin-walled objects. Indeed, such mixtures, which were developed by the inventors hereof, have been found to be highly moldable and can be extruded and/or rolled into thin-walled sheets, even as thin as 0.1 mm. Such mixtures and methods used to manufacture sheets therefrom are set forth more fully in copending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/101,500, entitled "Methods and Apparatus for Manufacturing Moldable Hydraulically Settable Sheets Used in Making Containers, Printed Materials, and Other Objects," filed Aug. 3, 1993 (pending) (hereinafter the "Andersen-Hodson Technology").
Although the hydraulically settable binder is believed to impart a significant amount of strength, including tensile and (especially) compressive strengths, such materials have been found in lower quantities to act less as a binding agent and more like an aggregate filler. As a result, studies have been conducted to determine whether sheets which do not necessarily use a hydraulically settable binder (or which only use such a binder in low enough quantities so that it will act mainly as an aggregate material) but which incorporate high concentrations of inorganic material can be manufactured. Such sheets would have the advantages of hydraulically settable sheets over prior art paper, plastic, and metal materials in terms of their low cost, low environmental impact, and the ready availability of abundant starting materials.
Due to the more recent awareness of the tremendous environmental impacts of using paper, paperboard, plastic, polystyrene, and metals for a variety of single-use, mainly disposable, items such as printed sheets or containers made therefrom (not to mention the ever mounting political pressures), there has been an acute need (long since recognized by those skilled in the art) to find environmentally sound substitute materials. In particular, industry has sought to develop highly inorganically filled materials for these high waste volume items.
In spite of such economic and environmental pressures, extensive research, and the associated long-felt need, the technology simply has not existed for the economic and feasible production of highly inorganically filled, organic polymer bound materials which could be substituted for paper, paperboard, plastic, polystyrene, or metal sheets or container products made therefrom. Some attempts have been made to fill paper with inorganic materials, such as kaolin and/or calcium carbonate, although there is a limit (about 20-35% by volume) to the amount of inorganics that can be incorporated into these products. In addition, there have been attempts to fill certain plastic packaging materials with clay in order to increase the breathability of the product and improve the ability of the packaging material to keep fruits or vegetables stored therein fresh. In addition, inorganic materials are routinely added to adhesives and coatings in order to impart certain properties of color or texture to the cured product.
Nevertheless, inorganic materials only comprise a fraction of the overall material used to make such products, rather than making up the majority of the packaging mass. Because highly inorganically filled materials essentially comprise such environmentally neutral components as rock, sand, clay, and water, they would be ideally suited from an ecological standpoint to replace paper, paperboard, plastic, polystyrene, or metal materials as the material of choice for such applications. Inorganic materials also enjoy a large advantage over synthetic or highly processed materials from the standpoint of cost.
Inorganic materials not only use significant amounts of nondepletable components, they do not impact the environment nearly as much as do paper, paperboard, plastic, polystyrene, or metal. Another advantage of inorganically filled materials is that they are far less expensive than paper, paperboard, plastic, polystyrene, or metals. Inorganically filled materials also require far less energy to manufacture.
Based on the foregoing, what is needed are improved compositions and methods for manufacturing highly inorganically filled organic polymer mixtures that can be formed into sheets and other objects presently formed from paper, paperboard, polystyrene, plastic, glass, or metal.
It would be a significant improvement in the art if such compositions and methods yielded highly inorganically filled sheets which had properties similar to paper, paperboard, polystyrene, plastic, or metal sheets. It would also be a tremendous advancement in the art to provide compositions and methods which allow for the production of highly inorganically filled sheets having greater flexibility, tensile strength, toughness, moldability, and mass-producibility compared to materials having a high content of inorganic filler.
In addition, it would be a significant improvement in the art if such sheets, as well as containers or other objects made therefrom, were readily degradable into substances which are commonly found in the earth. It would also be a tremendous improvement in the art if such sheets could be formed into a variety of containers or other objects using existing manufacturing equipment and techniques presently used to form such objects from paper, paperboard, polystyrene, plastic, or metal sheets.
Many containers, which can be formed without the need for any bending or folding, are readily adaptable to be manufactured from inorganic materials. These include plates, cups, utensils, etc. Many other types of containers such as boxes, clamshells, etc., however, require a material that can be bent and/or folded to form the desired shape and still be competitive in cost to manufacture. Accordingly, what is needed is a hinge adapted for use with an inorganically filled material and, more particularly, a hinge that can be integrally formed as part of a sheet of inorganically filled material that permits the sheet to be bent or folded into various configurations to form a variety of types of containers.
Hinges known as "living hinges" have been used in the past on various plastic molded products. A living hinge may be bent multiple times without breakage or fracture of the hinge material. Living hinges have been formed from soft, flexible thermoplastic elastomers that exhibit high endurance to flexural fatigue. Living hinges can take various shapes and have been used on various plastic molded parts to provide pivotal movement between adjacent rigid parts.
Scoring is a technique that has been used to provide memory to sheet materials, such as paper-based materials, so that they bend in the same place along the scoring line. These materials are bent toward the score. Scoring of a paper-based material damages the fibers at the score, making the material weaker in the area of the score, which provides for the bending of the material along the score. Scoring has been used on various products such as on cardboard boxes to provide bendable flaps to close the box, foldable game boards, file folders, etc.
Scoring an inorganically filled material to produce a hinge for bending of the material has not been heretofore possible since such a material was previously too thick or too brittle to provide an effective bending point without breaking.
Therefore, there is a need for a hinge for inorganically filled materials that is at least as good as hinges used on prior paper or plastic products in order to produce various containers having easily bendable portions. Such a hinge is disclosed and claimed herein.